The first one when they start is from NG2 Stage 2-2, the next is from NG1 Stage 5-1 which is followed by NG1 Stage 4-3 (scene witht the fan). When the Ninja is playing it’s the NG1 boss battle music. And in the long training sequence it’s NG1 Stage 4-2.

I Beat the the boss that you couldn’t but It gets worse…..there’s another Boss after it which is even Harder……A Demon Statue. I’ve tried attacking it but no matter how long I try, it’s health doesn’t seem to go down….and yes when you die at this one you go back to the beginning of the stage. Very good video.
Cheers!

oh man. i remember renting this from a small little rental store in a small little town that i lived in, in kansas. i was pretty young when i tried to tackle this one. .p.s. i never came close to finishing it. tried it again later in life and still got my ass whipped. ahhhh the memories.

I was a Ninjaholic when I was a kid – if it contained Ninjas it was awesome to me – this is one of the Reasons I love Ninja Gaiden – never beat it through. I can get past Jaquio with some Luck but then the Demon kills me – maybe I beat it one day.

He was never in Virtua Fighter. He was in the Dead Or Alive games, which both Ninja Gaiden, and the DOA franchise was made by Team Ninja. He’s been a playable character in the DOA games since the first one.

no one noticed the similarity between castlevania and ninja gaiden?
Ninja Gaiden and Castlevania have the exact same style of lifebar etc(upper side of the screen), both use music with drum samples, in both you have a short range weapon, in both you attack lamps/candles to get upgrades, in both you hold a single upgrade secondary weapon except for the cutscenes I felt like playing a Castlevania 1 graphics/music only hack .
It even shares some glitches like enemies respawning when leaving/returning screen.

This was hands down one of the most challenging video games I have ever had the privilage to play. I played it at a friends house while I was in grade school and as soon as I reaquired an NES I sought this game out. Needless to say, this game chewed my balls off and spit them up my ass. I am proud to say that I have in fact beat this game. I have only done this one time and never have I ever reproduced the end credits.

This video was a classic reminder of the profanity that flew from my mouth when I played it, and I was rolling in laughter seeing you hung up in the exact same places I was by those fucking piece of shit birds.

Probably the thing that most connects this game with Castlevania is the fact that you fly back every time you get hit and then you can fall into pits and water and die (yeah I know avgn has talked about this a lot but it bears repeating until no video game or movie features that bullshit ever again!). I remember that the Tecmo games were particularly infested with this to the point that even Tecmo Bowl had characters flying improbably all over the screen. At least then there was some kind of purpose to that weird football player enemy in the Ninja Gaiden games. What the fuck was that anyway?
A key to a lot of the landing issues is using the jump&slash, but if you don’t have it, you’re screwed, and there are parts where you might want to use other weapons. I haven’t played this series in a long time, but I do remember holding onto that jump&slash as best I could.

ok I just “popped that fucker in” and it is just as great and just as hard as I remember it from back when it was new. At the end of a boss battle you lose all your “spiritual strength” which, like the hearts in Castlevania powers your weapons. Another similarity to Castlevania is that there is generally a weapon you actually want and one or several on a stage you do not want, but you need to kill those lamps and collect those powerups, whatever they are, fast. So you end up with the wrong weapon a lot, and I still say the jump&slash was the most useful because although it burned “spiritual power” every time you jumped and used your sword at least with a spinning buzzsaw you had some hope of landing in more difficult spots. I forgot that the “invincible fire wheel” left you with no weapon at all. I forgot how relentless the timer was. This is still a great game though and a classic.

The trick on the last level is to not die. If you die there you are most likely screwed royally. Master the first fight and analyze the attack pattern of the Jaquio so you can take him out without taking too many hits. The last boss is a breeze if you can make it through the first two the initial attempt. Just keep pounding him, take out his tail and wail on him dodging his junk and he goes down quick.

Hey nerd this is a totaly serious comment…
My friend was tripping on shrooms and was just spewing stuff right,And he was listening to this episode and starting saying something about how all the stuff you say can be linked to life,I thought he was just tripping but then i started listening to what you and the ninja were saying.

“nobody has the curtesy to refile your life bar” Its true nobudy is going to help you A GOD isnt just going to refill your life so you just have to deal with what life you have left or something like that.

“You must look before you leap” Agian true you must look at what your going to do before you do it.

I:ve watched this video many times, and it remains as one of my favorites. Kevin Finn:s first episode, and a damn good performance, i just love that guy. anyway, i desided to download the game on wii and i love the game but i think this game was programed by the devil. Finishing ninja gaiden is a true achievement and something you want to have on your resume. thank you James for this wonderfull episode, and to Kevin Finn

When James asks “How am I supposed to get past this guy?” (The dude with the gun), I can answer you quite clearly. From experience with the game and by simply looking at the video. Well, you jump down after he’s shot at you and grab the wall. After he shoots, jump and slash him. That’s it. For someone who’s been playing Nintendo since… ’88 (I think it was ’88), you don’t seem to be noticing the things you should. I’ve been playing NES for about a year and I can beat Ninja Gaiden. Am I missing something here?

James, I found a way to finish this game. You still need to die a couple of times, but I’ll garantee you will finish.

Your weapon of choice, for all of the bosses, should be the windmill(the one that Ryu pulls out his sword as he jumps and kills everything on your path). YOU CAN ACTUALLY KILL ANY BOSS IN ONE JUMP!!!!!!!

Now the problem with the windmill is that is used automatically right after you jump and we know that we jump a lot in this game. To hold Ryu from spinning while equipped the windmill you have to press DOWN on the D-pad BEFORE hitting the sword button. This way you can save the energy used to use weapons for the bosses. Yeah it’s a pain in the ass to do that, but once you master it, you’ll thank me later (and if you do I wish you’ll do it in another review of this game if you ever do it). On a boss, just jump close to it and see that life bar of his fly out!!!!

On the last stage there’s a point where you get the windmill DON’T FKIN USE IT ANYWHERE ELSE (Except at that part where you showed it a lot in the video. There’s no way out without the windmill). On the final boss use the windmill technique. Yes, you might die in the 2nd cause you’ll use all of the weapons energy (or the game will deplete it to count it as points, I don’t remember well), but you try again from the beginning of 6-1, get the windmill, save it for the 2nd boss, rinse and repeat. 3rd boss, jump/windmill, boss life bar depleted, cut scene, YOU’VE WON!!!!!

This is the ONLY way ” I ” have finished the game. Any other way…. ? No fckin clue. Hope that solves the problem and helps you finally finish it!!!

( I have been huge AVGN fan since 2006, and after watching 100 episodes of James as the Nerd, he’s inspired me to make my own show, reviewing shitty Wii games! So if you have the time, check out my vid on youtube where i review probably the worst Wii game of all time Party Pigs Farmyard Games! )

I’m rather surprised if you’ve never beat this game. I duno if your saying that just for the video or not but it is beatable. I have taken down the 1st and 2nd one with no cheats and very little assistance from glitches. These games are doable but it takes alot of time and pationce. Good luck if you ever do decide to try and beat the game again.

I have to say this is great episode, just excellent. Every NES player in the entire world can relate to the hardness of Ninja Gaiden. AVGN in this episode is hilariously frustrated rather than just angry and Kevin Finn makes the perfect ninja. Great stuff man.

I think this episode is the best I’ve seen so far. Love the whole training part and stuff. Are the Ninje Gaiden games developed by the same game company as the Castlevania games?
I’m probably a noob asking this, but I noticed the game has exactly the same life bar and power ups system in as in Castlevania.

Furthermore, Shinobi on the Sega 8-bit was also an excellent game, as was The Last Ninja trilogy on the C64

out of all of James videos that he created for the angry video game nerd, i can say that this was his best and my fav one i would watch this review any time (as well as zelda 2 and the castlevania review) keep up the great work

Yesterday, I have finally finished NG1 on the NES.
What I did is use the diagonal fireball rings on all 3 final bosses. Unfortunately, that means I re-did all 6-1, 6-2 and 6-3 an insane number of times but I finally did it! What I do is, in the final stage, I get all the weapon energy up until the boss. I try to avoid using any of the special weapons until the boss. And if I die somewhere in the stage or lose too much health, I get game over on purpose to restart from the beginning of 6-3 and get the opportunity to collect everything again without getting hit too many times or dying.
At the beginning of the last section of 6-3, there is a health power-up that you can re-collect by backtracking to the last section and coming back.
About that motherfucker in 6-2, all you have to do to make it disappear is to take babysteps and leave him on the very edge of the screen until it disappears, then you jump the hole while slashing to take out the bird. (After the mofo disappears, don’t stop on your way to the hole, or the bird will have enough time to hit you.)
Well, all of this is easier said than done, but after playing those 3 stages so many times, you actually become a real ninja and are able to blast through with minimal damage. Still hard as shit though. : P

If it weren’t for the ZSNES emulators “load from saved game position”option i would’ve never beat this game.Jaquio was an ass to beat.His first form was so damn hard,but his last form was easy as hell.

I just got this game yesterday for nes and got to the 4-4 boss down to 2 bars left and gave up because it was late. and shit man. stage 3-2 is a fucking bitch. i had to redo it so many fucking times i was able to go through the whole level without getting hit once all because of the fucking asshole that blocks the cliff you have to jump on to enter in the boss’s cave.

Even though the first two had unlimited continues, I never beat those games, never had patience when it came to Jaquio. Despite the third having limited continues, its actually the easiest. Fewer enemies and the jump back after getting hit was A LOT smaller. Beat that one many times.

However with the Virtual Wii, many of the more classic games are blocked from ROM download, unless you risk visiting the more “underground” of the ROM sites, which means get some virus protection if you use them.

Say, if he had infinite lives, wouldn’t that mean he could continually keep playing the boss? Infinite lives means no continue, therefore, no start from 6-1. That’s just an observation I saw, not a critique.

The farthest I have ever gotten in this game was stage 6-2, birds and jetpack ninjas that throw shuriken are probly my most hated enimes in any video game also this has nothing to do with Street Fighter or Shinobi however it would later become part of the Dead or Alive Fighting game series